What We Played #120: Rage, Real Boxing & Castle of Illusion

I’m struggling to find both the time and enthusiasm for gaming at the moment and that’s reflected in the fact that all I’ve played this is a bit of the brilliant Pikmin 3 while dinner was cooking at the weekend.

DanToo doesn’t seem to be having anything like the same issues of focus and desire if his WWP list is a reliable indication.  He’s been heading into the expanses of his unfinished game collection and started with Rage.

I really like it but sadly my eyes don’t quite feel the same. The texture pop in and general look to the game gives me motion sickness. I had the same problem with Resistance 3: after playing 2 hours I was ‘sidelined’ for a day and a half, without being able to stay on my feet! So I think Rage will go back to collecting dust.

Not an auspicious start but did it get any better when he tried Castlevania: Lords of Shadow? “I quickly realised why I stopped playing it – a puzzle which I can’t complete. That went and joined Rage.”  Ah.

Next up a game that is winking at me from my own pile of shame Deus Ex: Human Revolution.  Dan says “I was absolutely loving up until I reached the second boss fight”. and goes on to describe feeling about the game that many of us have shared:

I’m playing through the game on Hard, so it’s really difficult, and the boss fights are competently out of place with the stealthy nature of the game. Really poor design choice. Other than that it’s a wonderful game.

Couldn’t agree more.  His last gaming adventure this week was to give his fingers and thumbs a good workout in the ring with Real Boxing on PS Vita.  Watch for his full review early next week but he reckons it’s a great game for filling those odd ten minutes.

Running a pub and trying not to ignore the wife too much has seen Dom’s limited gaming time shared between Tekken Revolution on his PS3 and still more Monster Hunter on his 3DS.  Remember those thing?  They’re like a weird Nintendo 2DS that’s been snapped in half and patched up with a hinge.

Dom has come up with a sneaky way to build more gaming time into his life though by hosting a monthly Fight Game night in his pub!  Featuring Street Fighter 4, UMVC3 and others.  It was a good excuse for investing in a new arcade fight stick too…

Another of our merry band stuck in “a bit of a weird funk game wise” is Aran.  He’s played through Castle of Illusion HD for us, another review to catch next week, and dabbled here and there with Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and New Little Kings Story.  He’s quickly bored of all of them though.

Meanwhile Blair has been playing Jak & Daxter HD, which he described as a “great platformer” and “a nice, fun distraction”. It’s also the first game he’s played in the last month that he hasn’t done so for the purposes of writing about (well he has now!). He has also been playing Killzone: Mercenary on his PlayStation Vita, though he’s not ready to talk about it until the review embargo lifts next Wednesday.

Whether it be the relentless march towards the end of summer here in the Northern Hemisphere, having too many other things to do or something else entirely we’re not the happy little gamers we normally are.

Even the prospect of the next generation hasn’t really got me excited despite the fact I’ve got my PS4 on pre-order.  Are any of you feeling the same way?  Or if you have in the past, how did you shake yourself out of it?